


Hey Soul Sister

by AlexIsNotOkay



Category: Persona 5
Genre: F/F, Incest, Soulmate AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-29
Updated: 2018-05-29
Packaged: 2019-05-15 06:26:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14785230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlexIsNotOkay/pseuds/AlexIsNotOkay
Summary: Soulmates should be a source of unbelievable happiness. But for Sae Niijima, living with the secret that her soulmate is her own younger sister, they're anything but.





	Hey Soul Sister

Soulmates. They were something that had been around for as long as anyone could remember. The idea that every person, no matter who they were, had someone else, somewhere in the world, that they were destined for. Someone they were meant to be with, on a truly cosmic level. Someone who they had been made for, and who had been made for them. Someone they were supposed to spend the rest of their life with.

It wasn’t just a whimsical idea or a theory posed by the romantics of the world, either. Soulmates were a very real, very proveable thing, and they had been finding each other for hundreds upon hundreds of years. Every person was born seeing the world in black and white and shades of gray, devoid of any color. It was only when they met their fated person and touched them for the first time that their vision suddenly filled in with the rush of vibrant hues they had been blind to before, and they knew they were fated to be together. It was a beautiful moment, on the people who had experienced it often described as profound, breathtaking, stunning. The happiest moment of their entire lives, some would say. But soulmates weren’t always a source of pure joy.

Some people would spend their entire lives without ever crossing paths with the one they were destined for, waiting more and more desperately for a day that would never come. Others would, after enough years of loneliness, accept that they would never find their fated person, and would settle down with someone else they loved instead, only to suddenly cross paths with their true soulmate years later. And, as was the case with one Sae Niijima, some people would discover that their soulmate was their own sister.

That was the secret Sae had been living with for the past eighteen years of her life: the person she was fated to be with was her own younger sister, Makoto. She didn’t have many memories that stretched that far back into childhood, but she could still vividly recall being eight years old, standing in the hospital room by the side of her mother’s bed with her father beside her, reaching out to hold her newborn sister, and suddenly seeing everything in color for the first time. It had startled her, so much that she had nearly dropped Makoto, and her parents had immediately been able to tell that something was wrong, but she had said nothing. She had always been smart for her age, and even as young as she was, she still new enough to know that something was wrong about this. Even in her eight year old mind, she knew this wasn’t the way things were meant to be. Not between sisters.

So, for eighteen years she had guarded that secret, and for the most part it had been easy. Makoto, only a few hours old when it had happened, obviously had no recollection of suddenly seeing the world in color. As a child who had known color all her life, she hadn’t even realized that anything was unusual, or been able to communicate it. She had already been three years old by the time their parents realized, and by that point Makoto had come into contact with so many people they had no way of narrowing down the field or figuring out who it might have been. One of the neighborhood children she always went out and played with, they suspected, though they could never guess who. Only Sae knew the truth, and she had no intention of sharing it.

The more time passed, the heavier that secret began to weigh on her. When it had first happened she had kept the secret out of some bizarre childish compulsion, left with the feeling that it was wrong without truly understanding why. It was like a kid getting in trouble at school and getting yelled at, but never quite knowing what they had done wrong in the first place. But as time went on, Sae started to understand it more and more. That was her sister. Not just her sister, but her  _ younger  _ sister. Someone she was meant to protect and look after and take care of. Someone who looked up to her. Someone she was meant to be a role model for. And instead she had these perverse, twisted feelings hanging over her constantly, tarnishing the entire bond between them. How could she ever forgive herself for something like that?

Crushing guilt aside, the secret was at least easy to keep to herself. Whenever she was asked, by a nosy officemate or a distant relative, she simply lied and said she still hadn’t met her soulmate, that she was still seeing the world in black and white. There were occasional moments when she nearly slipped up, and she caught herself starting to mention a red car or ask someone to hand her the blue folder, but so far she had never misstepped critically enough for her cover to be blown. And fortunately, it wasn’t the sort of thing most people dug too deeply into in the first place.

Sae’s relationship with Makoto had changed a lot over the years. Their parents weren’t around any longer, and the two of them had moved from the suburbs further into the city. They still lived together, but it was just the two of them now, and Sae provided for Makoto while her younger sister went through high school. Keeping a secret like this one had always put some distance between them, at least from Sae’s side of the issue. A part of her wanted, more than anything, to be closer to Makoto, not just because of any twisted romantic feelings she might have had, but precisely in spite of them. She wanted to prove she was  _ better  _ than that, that she could cast aside any perverse destiny she might have been saddled with and be the caring, supportive, protective older sister she was supposed to be. But every time Makoto started to get close to her Sae was reminded of the enormous secret she was hiding from the one person she was supposed to care about above all else, and the guilt became so heavy in her stomach that she ended up pushing her sister away instead.

Maybe that was why she had been spending so much time at the office recently. She could make up as many excuses as she wanted about how work was just taking a lot out of her, about how she really needed to work through this case, about how she was chasing a promotion. But at the center of it all, the truth was simple: she was avoiding Makoto. She felt bad knowing she was leaving her sister home alone so many nights of the week, stuck in that empty apartment all by herself. But she felt even worse when she actually had to go home and look Makoto in the eyes, knowing everything she knew.

She couldn’t stay away forever, though. She hadn’t even been home the night before, texting Makoto to tell her she would be staying at the office overnight, only grabbing a few hours of sleep at her desk somewhere between three and six am. The promise of actually getting to lay down in her own bed and have a meal that wasn’t out of a vending machine should have been appealing to her. Instead it was just overshadowed by knowing she would have to face Makoto before she was able to do any of that.

She had texted Makoto a few minutes earlier to let her sister know she was on her way home, and now Sae was climbing the stairs of the apartment building (if she took the stairs instead of using the elevator she could at least pretend she was healthy, as if that one little thing would balance out the lack of sleep or the amount of caffeine she pumped into her system). She held her keys in her hand, letting them jingle and rattle with each step she took until she finally reached their floor. She approached their apartment, fitting the keys into the lock and opening the front door. And when she did so, she was immediately greeted by a delicious smell.

Stepping into the apartment, Sae could see Makoto standing in the kitchen by the stove, and it was clear that was where the smell was coming from. There were a few pans out in front of her, sizzling away, and when the door opened Makoto turned around, looking a little surprised to see Sae there.

“Oh, sis! You’re home sooner than I expected. Dinner’s not quite done yet,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

“You… Made dinner?” Sae replied, and Makoto nodded.

“It’s curry, I hope that’s alright. I got some pointers from Sakura-san, and I wanted to put them to use.” Sojiro Sakura was a man they both knew, though in different ways, and for different reasons. Sae’s relationship with him was mostly formal, since she often found herself sitting in the coffee shop he owned, ordering something when she needed help making it through the rest of the day. Makoto, on the other hand, had become quite close with the boy who lived in the attic up above the shop, and spent a good amount of time over there as a result. In the process, it seemed like she and Sojiro had become friendly with each other as well.

“I’ll be interested to see if those pointers actually work,” Sae replied, sliding her shoes off and walking towards the couch to set down her bag. “I can’t imagine he’d just go around giving away his secret recipe like that, though if this curry is even half as good as his it will still be worth it.” After saying that, however, Sae ended up pausing, looking back towards Makoto, who in turn had returned her attention to her cooking once more. “You didn’t have to do this, though,” she added on. “We could have just ordered out.”

“But ordering out too much gets expensive,” Makoto was quick to reply. “And it’s generally not as good for you either. I got all of these vegetables directly from Haru’s rooftop garden and prepared them myself, so I know they’re healthy.”

“Well… Thank you,” Sae ended up saying. “I’ll set the table while you finish up.” Makoto had already had to worry about cooking the entire meal, after all, so it didn’t feel right to make her worry about the little tasks like these as well. Moving to the cupboards Sae got out two plates, two glasses, two sets of silverware, two napkins, putting them all out in two settings, right across the table from each other. There were more spots available, but she and Makoto always took the same seats every single time anyway- at least, on the rare occasions when they ate dinner together to begin with.

It didn’t take long after that for Makoto to come over with the pans, scooping out a serving of curry and rice for each of them. It smelled even more delicious up close, and seeing it sitting there in front of her reminded Sae of just how poor her eating habits had been over the past week. She didn’t even like Big Bang Burger, but it had made up more of her meals than she cared to admit. With the food tempting her as it was it took a great deal of self restraint for Sae to prevent herself from digging in before Makoto got back to the table, but she was able to hold back, if only barely. The moment her sister was seated, though, she was putting the first forkful into her mouth. And the moment she did so her, face was lighting up.

“Makoto,” Sae said, barely event taking the time to swallow first. “This is delicious.”

“Really?” Makoto replied, and her voice carried a note of genuine surprise, perhaps mixed with excitement, as if she hadn’t expected the compliment. “I tried using a different spice blend than usual, so I wasn’t entirely sure how it would turn out.”

“It’s excellent, really,” Sae assured her. “You should be proud of this.” Makoto didn’t say anything after that, but she was smiling softly when she looked back down at her plate, apparently taking Sae’s advice to heart. And just like that the secret was back, staring Sae in the face all over again.

It happened like this any time there started to be a nice moment between herself and Makoto. She could never simply enjoy it, or appreciate the bond they had as sisters. Any time she tried, she would just end up being reminded of the twisted feelings she was harboring, the lies she kept telling Makoto, the fact that this was all  _ wrong _ . Why did she even give Makoto that compliment in the first place? Was it really innocent, simply because she wanted her little sister to feel good about herself? Or was there some darker, more sinister reason behind it? By the time Makoto looked back up from her plate all of these worries had apparently written themselves over Sae’s face, because Makoto’s brow immediately creased itself down in concern.

“Sis?” she asked, violently snapping Sae away from her thoughts. “Is something wrong?” Sae froze for a moment, staring back at Makoto for a few seconds before she was able to pull her eyes away, shaking her head quickly.

“It’s nothing. Just… Work,” she lied. “I haven’t been able to get this case off my mind.”

“Oh…” she heard Makoto reply. “Do you know how much longer it will be?” That question caught Sae equally as off guard as the first one, and she slowly found her eyes drawn back towards Makoto again.

“Why do you ask?”

“Just… Because I was wondering,” Makoto said. “You’ve been working so much lately, and you’ve barely even been home, so… Nothing,” she trailed off, shaking her head. “I shouldn’t have brought it up.”

“No,” Sae insisted. “Say it.”

“I was just… Hoping you would be able to be home more often soon,” Makoto admitted, before hastily starting to tack on apologies. “But I know I shouldn’t ask something like that. I know you don’t have a choice, and it’s selfish of me to-”

“You’re right. It is.” Those words sounded harsh, even to Sae herself. As the look of shock crossed over Makoto’s face, there was a part of her that knew she wasn’t being fair. There was nothing selfish about Makoto’s request to want to spend more time around her older sister, to wish that Sae didn’t spend so many nights stuck at the office without even returning home. But this was the way it always went, and acting this way was practically a knee jerk reaction by this point. Any time they started to get close again, any time there was a nice moment between them, Sae immediately set about trying to push Makoto away all over again. It was how they had been for years.

“I- I know,” Makoto ended up saying, clearly thrown off by her sister’s response. “I just-” But Sae wasn’t done.

“Do you know why I spend so much time at the office in the first place?” she went on. “Do you think it’s something I enjoy? It’s not. But it’s something I do because I have to. To pay the rent, and the bills, and to put food on the table. I don’t have a choice in the matter.”

“I know, I know,” Makoto repeated, shaking her head as she listened to her sister scold her. “It was stupid. I shouldn’t have asked.”A tense silence hung between them after that, and Sae hated this part just as much as she hated everything else. She didn’t feel good about what she had just done, and she certainly didn’t enjoy snapping at Makoto or yelling at her like that. The look of hurt on her sister’s face was difficult for Sae to ignore any time they had a moment like this, and more than anything she just wanted to rush across the table and wrap her sister in her arms and apologize for everything she had just said. But she knew she couldn’t do that. This was the way it had to be.

“No,” she did end up sighing, though her words weren’t nearly as heartfelt as she would have wanted them to be. “I didn’t mean to raise my voice. But I’m doing all of this for you.”

“I know you are,” Makoto replied, still not lifting her eyes to meet Sae’s gaze again. Sae looked at her for a few moments, but when it was clear Makoto wasn’t going to look back, she turned her attention to her plate instead.

“I’m going to finish my meal in my room,” she decided, picking up her dish as she rose from her chair. “I have more work I need to get done anyway.”

“I’m sorry…” Makoto murmured under her breath, though Sae pretended not to hear it.

“Goodnight, Makoto,” she said, grabbing her bag off the couch and walking towards her room.

“Goodnight, sis…”

* * *

 

It had been about a week since that last fight, and as she always did after they had a moment like that, Sae had been avoiding home even more than she usually did. Any time something like that happened it was even harder for her to go back and face Makoto than it would normally be, and as a result Sae found herself looking for more and more excuses to work long hours at the office. As much as it might have seemed otherwise, though, she couldn’t stay there forever, and eventually she did need to go back home. Still, even when she did return to the apartment her encounters with Makoto over the past week had been sparing at most. That was probably for the best.

But eventually a need for a hot shower and a meal that wasn’t purchased through a delivery service or out of a vending machine was finally getting to Sae, and she found herself returning home a bit earlier than she normally would have. It was only around seven pm, and while she half expected to end up going back to the office and spending the rest of the night there in just a few hours, she was still making the trip back to the apartment anyway. Just as she always did she took the stairs up towards the floor, fitting her keys into the lock and opening the door when she arrived. Looking to the side she noticed another set of shoes by the door, and a jacket hanging on the wall, suggesting to her that she wasn’t alone.

“Makoto?” she called out, down the hall towards their bedrooms. “Are you home?”

“S-Sis!” she heard Makoto blurt back out from inside her own room, and something about her voice seemed  _ off _ . It sounded strained, and surprised. Unsteady. “I- I didn’t think you would be home so soon!” Immediately after that Sae heard footsteps hitting the floor, and that set off red flags to her. She put her bag onto the table, practically dropping it there, and she didn’t even bother to remove her shoes before she was walking down the hall at a brisk pace, pushing herself forward with each long stride. She wasn’t sure what she was expecting to see inside her sister’s room. Drugs and alcohol, maybe? Or perhaps a boy, half naked in her bed. Neither seemed like the sort of thing Makoto would be likely to do, and maybe Sae was just being paranoid, but this was clearly  _ something _ . She was prepared for the worst when she rounded that corner, whatever the worst may have been.

Instead, when she reached Makoto’s door, she was greeted by the sight of her younger sister hastily and unsuccessfully trying to slam it shut. And she had very clearly been crying.

An immediate stillness set over the two of them when they saw each other. Sae became frozen as she looked down towards Makoto, still trying to process what she was taking in. And Makoto seemed similarly shocked as she looked back up at Sae, realizing she had been caught. She didn’t even bother trying to close the door any longer. Her eyes were read and irritated, and there were still tears running down her cheeks. She didn’t want to be seen like this, but she couldn’t escape from it now.

“Makoto… Are you- What’s wrong?” Sae struggled to put that sentence together. Feelings weren’t something she was good at dealing with- in fact, she generally made a point of actively avoiding them. The night their father had died had been the last time she had seen Makoto cry, and ever since then both of them seemed to have gotten into the habit of pushing everything they felt below the surface and never discussing it. But now, when it was staring her right in the face like this, Sae couldn’t just ignore whatever Makoto was dealing with. As much as seemed like Makoto might have wanted that.

“It’s- It’s nothing,” Makoto hastily replied. She shook her head, then reached up to dry her eyes with the sleeve of her shirt, turning her back to Sae. “Just… Just some dumb high school drama.” After Makoto said that Sae stood frozen for another moment, silently debating how to proceed from here while she watched Makoto move towards her bed. It would be easy to just drop it and walk away, to take what Makoto had said at face value and believe it was nothing, but… That wouldn’t be right, would it? That wasn’t the way an older sister was supposed to handle a situation like this one. The only problem was, Sae didn’t know how she actually  _ was  _ meant to handle it. Knowing all the wrong ways didn’t teach her the right one.

“If it’s bothering you this much, then it’s clearly not nothing.” Those words left Sae’s mouth with more confidence and conviction than the last set, and they caused Makoto to stop halfway across the room. Another pause before she spoke.

“Really, i-it’s- it’s nothing,” she insisted. Her voice was weaker though, softer than before, and hearing that uncertainty prompted Sae to step forward and approach her.

“It’s something,” Sae repeated. “Talk to me.” Some part of her already knew this was a mistake, that she wasn’t adequately prepared for what she was getting herself into. But it was far too late for her to back away from it now. And as Makoto turned around to meet Sae’s gaze again, Sae could see the absolute surprise on her face. Neither of them had been expecting this.

“It’s… Akira,” Makoto finally said. Even though she had been daring to meet her sister’s eyes for a moment, it was at that point that they broke away, and she found herself looking back down towards the ground. “He met his soulmate today… Some boy from Kosei. We were out in Shibuya after classes, and we ran into him. And as soon as they touched…” Makoto trailed off after that, and Sae was easily able to fill in the rest of the story. And for some reason she didn’t want to think about or acknowledge, the fact that Makoto was upset about this left Sae with a disgusting feeling in the pit of her gut.

“Did you have feelings for him?” she asked, and she was met with an overwhelming, shameful sense of relief when Makoto shook her head.

“No, it’s not like that,” she replied, keeping her eyes on the ground. “It was just, seeing the two of them together like that, finding each other for the first time…” Once more her words trailed off, though Sae didn’t speak to fill the silence this time. A moment later Makoto lifted her head, and Sae could see that the tears had started again. Her hands were balled up tightly at her sides, and her voice cracked as she spoke again. “Why didn’t I get to have that?”

The sense of guilt Sae felt when she heard that was devastating. It was always there, of course, always lingering at the back of her mind any time she looked at Makoto, any time she thought about her sister’s future, but this made it a thousand times worse. It was a tightness in her chest, a twisting in her stomach, a dryness in her mouth. This was quite possibly the most distraught Sae had ever seen Makoto, and Makoto was looking to her for an answer Sae had but could never give.

“You- You will,” Sae lied. “Some day. Just because you haven’t found them yet-” But she didn’t even have the chance to finish the sentence before Makoto was interrupting her, a note of desperation now creeping into her voice.

“When?” she demanded. “When will I find them? I still haven’t, and it’s been eighteen years. How am I even supposed to know when I meet them again if I already have once and I can’t remember it? I’ll never have a moment like Akira did. I could be seeing my soulmate every single day and I wouldn’t even have any way of knowing it!”

“You’ll find them eventually,” Sae repeated, though her own voice wavered now as the tightness in her chest grew even stronger. “You will. You just have to be patient.”

“It’s  _ different _ for me,” Makoto insisted. “Most people know for sure, but I’ll never be able to have that. I have to be out there searching, constantly, and wondering if I’ve found the right person. Even if I do find someone I’ll never be able to know for certain that they’re really the one I’m mean to be with! I don’t- I don’t want to be one of those people who never finds their soulmate,” she choked out. “I don’t want to be alone forever.” And then she was doubling over, hunching down and burying her face into her hands as a fresh wave of tears started to break through. In a split second it was like a damn had cracked, and muffled sobs escaped her as her entire body started to shake. Sae looked on in horror as her sister broke down right in front of her, frozen in place, unsure of what to do. This was  _ her _ fault. That was what her mind kept telling her, over and over and over again. She was the one who had done this to Makoto. She was the one who had caused her sister to feel this way. It was her lie, her secret, that had caused Makoto to crumble right in front of her. Seeing the person she loved and cared about above all else, the person she had sworn to look after and protect, the person she was fated to be with falling apart because of her was the most gut wrenching, unbearable sensation Sae had ever felt in her life. And that was what prompted her to throw away eighteen years of work and secrecy in a single moment.

“I know who your soulmate is.” The words left Sae’s mouth before she even had the chance to think about them properly, and as soon as they were out she seemed to freeze. Makoto went stock still, seemingly suspended in her half hunched over pose. Sae was trapped as well, realizing what she had just said. And then, very slowly, Makoto began to lift her head, until she was looking directly at her sister again. Everything was silent for a moment longer before she spoke, voice little more than a whisper.

“You what…?” she asked, and Sae’s blood ran cold. It took a moment for the weight of what she’d just said to set in, but when it did hit, it hit hard. Suddenly her heart was beating entirely too fast, and she immediately started to backtrack, trying to find a way out of the situation she had just gotten herself into.

“I-” Sae stuttered out, desperately looking for a lie that would remedy this. But Makoto wasn’t going to give her the chance to find one.

“ _ Who? _ ” she asked, voice taking on a stern, commanding, almost angry tone all at once. “Is this a joke?”

“It’s- It’s not a joke,” Sae replied. “It’s-”

“Then  _ who is it? _ ” Makoto demanded. “Why are you telling me this now? Why have you never said anything about this before??”

“I couldn’t. I had to keep it a secret. If you knew who it was, you would understand.” Normally it was so easy for Sae to put up her cold exterior, to dismiss anything Makoto said, and to avoid the topic she didn’t want to talk about. But right now she was already working herself into an addled panic that was making it much harder to keep her thoughts straight, and to add to that, Makoto was showing a level of borderline fury Sae had never seen out of her before. Normally Makoto would cave and give up at the slightest sign of resistance. Sae wasn’t used to seeing her sister on the offensive like this.

“I’ve spent years and years worrying about this and you think there was a good reason not to tell me??” Makoto snapped. “Who is it??”

“I can’t say,” Sae repeated.

“You can, and you will!” Makoto spat back. “Why would you keep something like this from me??”

“If you know who it was you would understand,” Sae repeated. She was shutting her own eyes by this point, not able to bring herself to look at Makoto as her sister yelled at her. “You would get why I can’t tell you.”

“Then let me understand!” Makoto shouted. “I won’t get anything if you never tell me! Do you think you’re protecting me by doing this? Do you think I’m somehow better off this way?  _ Nothing  _ could ever hurt me as much as not knowing does! So just tell me!”

“I can’t!”

“Why not??”

“Because it’s me!”

Once again, the words escaped Sae before she had the chance to fully process them. But maybe there was a part of her that wanted this outcome, and that was what had compelled her to speak. Maybe she was tired of keeping this secret, of lying to Makoto. Maybe there was a part of her that finally wanted all of this to be out in the open, no matter what the consequences of that might have been. That didn’t mean she wouldn’t regret saying it the moment she had, though.

The shock written across Makoto’s face now was even more powerful than it had been when Sae had first mentioned knowing who her soulmate was. Her eyes were wide, and she looked like she was at a loss for words as the gears slowly turned away inside her head, processing what she had just heard. She didn’t know whether to believe it, and if it had been anyone else she would have thought it was just a joke in very bad taste. But she knew Sae would never joke about something like this. Finally, she just ended up asking.

“Are… Are you serious…?” Now it was Sae’s turn to fall silent. Her eyes were still closed, and at this point she was afraid to open them. She could imagine the look Makoto was giving her. It wasn’t something she wanted to see for herself.

“I- I am,” she replied, forcing herself to nod slowly. And then, very reluctantly, she started to recall what she remembered of that day. “When you were born, dad brought me into mom’s room to see you for the first time. They let me hold you. At first nothing happened, when I was only touching the blanket you were wrapped in. But when I reached up to touch your head… Suddenly I could see it. Everything. The entire world came into color all at once, and even back then I knew precisely what it meant.”

“What… What about mom and dad?” Makoto whispered. “Did they tell you not to tell me…?” For a moment there, Sae saw a window. A window where she could shed all of the guilt she had been carrying, pass it onto someone else, be absolved of everything she had done wrong in her sister’s eyes. And the offer was so, so painfully tempting. But she knew she couldn’t do that.

“No,” Sae replied, shaking her head now. “They never knew. I never told them. I never told anyone. I was the only person who was ever aware of this.”

“ _ Why? _ ” That was the next question to leave Makoto’s mouth, and it was actually somewhat surprising to Sae. She would have thought the answer was obvious, that she wouldn’t need to explain why she had kept something like this a secret. But as she opened her eyes and saw Makoto looking back at her, she saw the expression of pure hurt on her sister’s face. And suddenly, she had to wonder whether she had done the right thing in never telling Makoto the truth until now.

“How was I supposed to tell you something like this?” Sae started to ask. “How was I meant to-”

“So you thought keeping it a secret from me for eighteen years was a better option??” Makoto snapped. “Eighteen years of hiding the truth from me, making me think I would never find my soulmate, making me think- making me think I was wrong for feeling this way.” Those words struck Sae from nowhere. And while she didn’t want to jump to conclusions, she couldn’t stop her mind from automatically reaching one when it heard that.

“Feeling… Feeling what way?” she asked.

“Feeling like  _ this! _ Feeling like there was something wrong with me! Feeling like- Like I was  _ disgusting  _ for feeling the way I did?” Makoto’s voice was fluctuating wildly as she spoke, alternating between shouts and whispers and then back to shouts, all in the span of seconds. “I tried so hard to tell myself the feelings weren’t real, that I couldn’t possibly feel this way towards my own sister, that I was  _ broken _ somehow. And this entire time, you…”

“Makoto!” Sae cried out. “How was I supposed to know any of this? How was I supposed to think this was the right thing to do?”

“Because this affects me just as much as it affects you!” Makoto shouted back. “This should have been my decision too! You don’t get to control my entire life!”

“I’m not trying to control your-”

“Yes, you are! You always do! And I’m sick of it!” Makoto grabbed her bag off her bed where it was resting before shoving past Sae, moving towards her door. “I can’t be here right now. I’ll spend the night at Ann’s.”

“You’re just going to storm out like this?” Sae asked. “You’re going to throw a tantrum instead of sitting down and talking about this?”

“You’ve had eighteen years to decide you want to sit down and talk about this,” Makoto replied, looking back over her shoulder as she stood in the doorway. “You missed your chance.” And then the door was slamming shut, and Sae was left standing in Makoto’s room, alone, ears ringing from the noise.

* * *

 

Sae had spent the entirety of that night, and the next day, staring down at her phone and trying to decide whether or not to call Makoto. She knew this wasn’t the sort of thing she could ignore forever, and sooner or later her sister would have to come back home, at which point they would be forced to confront their problem head on. But every time she thought about dialing the number something stopped her, and it was starting to look more and more like she really was going to try to put this off for as long as she could.

She had expected Makoto to come home that night, if for no other reason than because she hadn’t packed any clothes with her when she had stormed out of the apartment, but that hadn’t happened. She stayed up until the early hours of the morning listening for the sound of someone coming in through the front door, but that sound never came. And by the time Sae was leaving for work again, there was still no indication that Makoto had ever come through the apartment. She was starting to get worried.

She got even more worried when she did finally break down and call, still torn between whether she was going to scold Makoto for running away and demand that she return home or break down and apologize for everything she had done. She didn’t get the chance to do either, though, as Makoto’s phone went straight to voicemail, and Sae didn’t bother to leave a message. Instead, she chose to do something borderline stupid, and uncharacteristically impulsive. It had taken some digging to find the address of the Takamaki family residence, though with Ann’s parents owning their own company it was listed on the legal documents tied to the corporation. And, with no other idea how to actually find her sister, Sae ended up making use of that information. That was how she found herself walking through the front gate of the Takamaki household around seven pm, slowly making her way up the path and approaching the door. She hesitated for a moment before reaching up and ringing the bell, but she knew this was something she had to do. If for no other reason than because Makoto couldn’t simply sleep on Ann’s couch forever.

Thirty or so seconds passed after Sae rang the bell, but eventually the door did open up, and she was greeted by the sight of the girl she recognized as Makoto’s friend. Ann, understandably, looked surprised to see her there.

“O-Oh, Niijima-san!” she stammered out. “I- I wasn’t expecting you!”

“I understand Makoto has been staying here. I’ve come to retrieve her.” It was easy, at least, to keep her expression and her voice stone cold when she was in Ann’s presence, though Sae knew some of that resolve would crumble the moment she actually saw Makoto. It seemed to have the desired effect, though, intimidating Ann into cooperation.

“Uh, r-right. She’s- She’s just upstairs. Come in,” Ann said, stepping backwards to allow Sae through. Sae entered the home, only pausing to remove her shoes by the door before looking back towards Ann expectantly. Ann nodded, and without another word she started to lead Sae upstairs, down the hall towards her own bedroom. The door was shut, and Ann stopped outside it, looking up towards Sae again. “She’s just in here,” the girl said, voice a bit more quiet now. “I’ll uh… I’ll let you go in alone.”

“Thank you,” Sae replied. And then she actually looked towards the door, and the steely demeanor she had been putting up was already starting to break. She found herself hesitating as she reached for the knob, just as she had when she had been standing outside Ann’s house to begin with. Ann was already disappearing back down the hall, accurately figuring this was a situation she wanted nothing to do with. And finally, Sae forced herself to open the door.

As the room came into view Sae saw Makoto sitting there on the edge of Ann’s bed, head down in a book. “Who was it?” Makoto asked, before lifting her head and finding an answer to her question. The moment she saw Sae standing there she froze, eyes going wide before suddenly narrowing again. “What are you doing here?” she hissed out, slamming her book shut.

“You’ve been gone for two days now,” Sae replied, letting the door to Ann’s room close behind her. “I’ve come to bring you home.”

“Then you’re wasting your time. I’m not going back there. 

“And what do you plan to do instead?” Sae asked. “You can’t expect to stay here forever. Where else will you go?”

“I’ll figure something out,” Makoto insisted. “But I’m not returning to a home where I have to spend every day feeling terrible about myself.” When Makoto said that Sae was silent for a moment, and then her expression softened, and she ended up looking more towards her feet than towards her sister.

“I’m not asking you to do that,” she eventually said. “I’m asking you to come back home so we can actually talk about this. Instead of shouting at each other and leaving things on a terrible note. I want you to come back home so we can deal with this properly.”

“And why should I believe that?” Makoto demanded. “It’s always been this way. Any time I feel something, any time I want to talk about anything, it always ends up the same. Nothing I say matters. I literally have to run away from home before you’ll come here and say you’ll listen to me. Why should I believe anything will be any different if I follow you back now?”

“Because… Because I don’t have any secrets to keep from you anymore,” Sae replied. She shut her eyes and let out a quiet sigh before she continued to speak, words threatening to catch in her throat. “Starting right now. Because the only other secret I have is to tell to you that… I’ve felt the same way.” There was a long silence after she said that, and once more Sae was afraid to open her eyes, to see the look on Makoto’s face. The longer the silence went on the more afraid she got, until she finally heard her sister’s voice breaking through it.

“What are you saying…?”

“I’m saying… I’m saying that I’ve had those same feelings, and those same fears. The fear that there’s something wrong with me, that I’m not meant to feel the way I do. Do you know the burden I’ve had to bear? Going through my entire life worrying that if ever for even a moment I let any of those feelings show through I would be taking advantage of you? Manipulating you? You’re the one I’m meant to take care of and protect. And I’ve lived in constant fear of tarnishing that.”

“And so you thought this was better??” Makoto protested. “You thought the way to deal with that was to push me away, and look down on me, and make me feel worthless??”

“I realize my attempts may have been misguided-”

“ _ Misguided?  _ I’ve spent my entire life feeling like I’m not good enough for you, and you’re telling me you were  _ misguided?? _ ” Sae heard Makoto’s voice crack as she said that, and when she opened her eyes she saw her sister staring back at her from the bed, tears rolling down her cheeks. Sae felt a twisting of guilt in the pit of her stomach. And then she finally said what she probably should have said years and years ago.

“I’m sorry.” But it was too little, too late.

“All I’ve ever wanted,” Makoto choked out, breaking her eyes away from Sae and looking down at her own lap as her tears fell down, “is to feel like I’m good enough for you. And never once have I been able to feel that way.”

“Makoto…” Now Sae’s own voice was the one to crack. She stayed rooted where she was for another moment before she found herself compelled to walk forward, not even sure what she would do when she reached her sister. She ended up crouching down in front of the bed, bringing herself closer to her sister’s eye level and looking up at her. “The only reason I’ve always tried so hard to push you away, to keep this rift between us… I couldn’t let myself get too close to you,” she admitted. “I thought that if I did… I didn’t think it was right to feel the way I did. I didn’t think it was acceptable to force that upon you.”

“You’re not f-forcing anything on me,” Makoto choked out, reaching up to wipe her eyes dry with her sleeve. “I- I know how I feel. I’ve felt this way for… For years…”

“Are you sure of that?” Sae asked.

“We’re… We’re soulmates, aren’t we?” Makoto whispered. “The universe can’t be wrong.” Sae was silent for a moment when Makoto said that, and then she found herself nodding slowly.

“I suppose you’re right,” she agreed. “It can’t.” Makoto slowly lifted her her head at that point, eyes that were still stained with tears meeting Sae’s.

“Then… What does this mean?” she asked. “For us?” Once more, Sae was silent for a long moment before she said anything.

“What do you want it to mean?” she asked.

“I… I don’t want to be alone anymore…” Makoto replied.

“Then you won’t have to be.” Makoto almost looked like she was in a state of disbelief when she heard that, and Sae supposed she couldn’t blame her. She seemed cautious, like it was hard for her to just take Sae’s word for that after everything that had happened between them. So Sae tried to prove it to her, saying something else she probably should have said so many times before. “I love you, Makoto.”

“I…” Makoto started to choke out, though the words seemed to get stuck as more tears began to run down her cheeks. “I love you too, sis…” she finally managed to say. And then, she asked a question bold enough she never thought she would actually end up asking it. “Can I… Can I kiss you?” Sae didn’t answer with words. Instead she simply nodded, reaching a hand up and out to cup her sister’s tear stained cheek. There was that slight moment of hesitation before the two of them both started to lean in towards each other, meeting halfway as their lips brushed against each other’s. Even spending most of her life subsisting off coffee and energy drinks, Sae still could have sworn her heart was beating faster in that moment than it ever had in her life. Her lips didn’t stay against Makoto’s for that long at all before the two of them were pulling away again, both still feeling half in disbelief over what had just happened, but even as brief as it was, it still felt like it might have lasted an entire lifetime. As they broke away she and Makoto both stared at each other for another moment, and then Sae leaned forward again, and Makoto did the same, this time letting their foreheads rest together.

“This isn’t going to be easy, you know,” Sae murmured.

“I know,” Makoto whispered back.

“Even if we’re soulmates… We’re still sisters. And if people were to find out…”

“I don’t care,” Makoto insisted. “Just… Just let us have this moment, okay, sis?”

“Alright,” Sae agreed. Whatever else the future might have had in store for them, that was something they would worry about later. Right now, she was happy just to finally be there, sharing this moment with her soulmate.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy birthday to the gayest little shit I know.


End file.
